This week on the Happy half Hour.
I think, really, with a new coaching staff and a new philosophy and a new quarterback and all this new stuff, I think there is a feeling of let's experiment with some of these guys. Let's cast a wide net. Let's continue to look at the waiver wire, see what's out there, and see how this thing develops.
Talks.
Do y know?
It's time for the Happy half Hour with your friends. Kristin Balboni, Augusta Stone, and Darren Gannon.
Hi, everybody, Welcome to the Happy half Hour. It's still August for a couple of minutes, which means we're on the verge of the regular season.
Hi, Augusta, Hello.
We're close for your weather update. I feel like I always get on here and talk about the weather. It feels wonderful outside. It feels like football season. The radio guys were talking about some acc football this weekend, and.
Then we're here, and then it's our time to shine in the NFL. I'm excited. How are you?
I'm all right.
I feel like I'm now obliged to do a traffic update. There was a lot of congestion at the corner of Minton Moorhead early this morning, as there always is, but news, traffic, sports, weather on the ones. I feel like we should patent that or something.
I don't know.
Anyway, it's almost football season, but that means we're at that weird point where this is like that flurry of activity, and this weekend is when everybody in the NFL sort of shuts up for a minute and it inhales and gets ready for the long march to come.
But it came at the end of a hectic week.
I mean, this is the last time we talked to you guys, there were about eighty people on the roster. There have been about thirty five cuts. There have been trades, there have been waiver claims, and this is a different looking bunch. How do you, Augusta, you know, still being kind of new to this process, sort of handle all this change and all this new stuff coming your way.
I think it's always one step at a time.
I saw you had a very apt tweet the other day about the weirdest day of practice is when you go from that nearly ninety to the fifty three before the practice squad is here, and it is just it looks bear out there. I will say from a coverage standpoint, it gets easier because you know all of the guys around after the cuts, so there's a familiarity that starts
that'll last pretty much through this season. So that in that way, like that makes it not easier, but it's different, you know, it's a different kind of groove where you're like, okay, I see there's not a ton of you know people or brand new people coming in, although, like you mentioned with the waiver wire and the trade couple days ago, there are new people here, which is exciting, and there's a lot cycling through, but like we talked about on
the last episode, it's still a tough a really tough.
Time of year.
You see some guys you know passing through, or a guy that you saw two days ago is now somewhere else or you know, not here, maybe you'll be back on the practice squad or who knows. It's kind of a lot of unknowns, and I think just remembering which around the building it's well, it's well done, but just remembering the humanity and everything, and you know, these are
more than just names and numbers of their people. And so now we're kind of reaching the point where things are starting to it was really shaky couple days ago.
Things are starting to mel out a little bit, but Frank Krak.
Told us yesterday he's not done, So yeah, we'll see what happens the rest.
Of the day.
None of these rosters are ever final. But you're right. Tuesday afternoon, when you see.
Fifty couple people out on the practice field, it's like the rapture.
Half of them have gone away.
The remnants are back here on Earth. So it is strange, it is unusual. But now we're kind of in that regular season mode, and it's probably worth kind of going through some of the top line news that came with
cuts and came with all the moves this week. And I told somebody, and I mentioned this in a piece on Panthers dot Com in the aftermath of the initial fifth one of the things that just kind of jumps out at me is this team trust offensive line coach James Campen implicitly because I think back to the massive conversion we've seen. I mean, and Jordan and j will be later this afternoon two you'll get to hear that
on all your favorite podcast avenues. But I think in terms of offensive linemen, what we've seen happen over the last couple of years is nothing short of remarkable. I mean two years ago, Matt Ruhle stood there in Spartanburg and said, yeah, this line's like I eight five. It's under construction, and it was full of potholes two years ago.
And then it got better. And now it got different because a year ago, going into the regular season, Bradley Boseman was still on the bench, and along with Cam Irving and Michael Jordan, you had, you know, a whole bunch of starts in reserve in addition to what they believed to be a pretty good front line. Then obviously Bradley goes into the starting lineup and that takes off and stays well and is together and performing at a high level.
Then the last game in New Orleans.
Brady Christiansen and Austin Corbett get heard. Austin still recovering. Things have shuffled a little bit, but it feels like they've kind of settled in with Chandler's of Avila a rookie in that group, but behind him, you've got Ricky Lee,
You've got Nash Jensen. Their three rookies among the eight they kept on the initial fifty three, and then they put in a claim for Calvin Throckmorton, who is a former Saint who's got about thirty some starts in the league on his on the back of his football card, so he brings a little experience to that group.
But it's still a fairly new group absolutely.
I mean they're getting into, like you said, like a lot of trust teacher camping mode. I'm looking at the depth chart right now in Panthers dot Com, which I work very hard helping on the back end to put together. So please check it out and enjoy it and love it and appreciate it. But Brady Christiansen, I do believe, is the second longest tenured line and at least here like physically with the Panthers, behind Taylor Moten who's been here for a while and played in all those games and stuff.
But that's he's going into his third year. Is that right?
Like I just it hit me because you look at you mentioned the three rookies. Throck Morton, who's here, who who we got to give a nickname to We've talked about because that is a that's a big old name. And then you have Bozman, a guy here last year May, He's like, I mean, just thinking about even the group itself, Gelling, they really are all kind of getting to know each other. And this is, like you said, a lot of faith in camping here to give him this group a lot of young guys.
To develop here and be like, Okay, go for it.
And I think another thing that you have mentioned, and I think I think you've mentioned in the past article at least in conversations, is that they're opting for you know, these young guys, maybe the guys like Ricky leean Ashtintz, and you can kind of maybe not mold them, but take them and see what they have and go up from here versus some of the guys who.
Have been around who maybe you know what I mean.
Like have the starts had the experience, but giving a chance to have like fresh blood out there, right, I think that's that's the most obvious thing there. But when looking at it, when you started talking, it was kind of surprising to me. I was like, dang, in terms of just being here in Carolina, there's only two guys that have been here longer than three.
The idea of grizzled veteran Brady Christians and kind of blows my mind. But that's the kind of transition, and it is a little symbolic of what's happened to this roster because, yeah, again we talk about cam Irving, Michael Jordan. Across this roster, a lot of those guys who were on it a week ago in kind of that veteran backup role. Those guys are gone. There's no more Dion Jones, there's no more Eric Row. Eric's back on the practice squad.
But across the board there are a lot of places that are being backed up by extremely young people, and it's kind of an opportunity. I think really, with a new coaching staff and a new philosophy and a new quarterback and all this new stuff, I think there is a feeling of let's experiment with some of these guys. Let's cast a wide net, let's continue to look at the waiver wire, see what's out there, and see how this thing develops.
Because I think.
Realistically, you know, everybody knows this thing still very much a work in progress. So if that means there's going to be a lot of turnover at the bottom five spots of the fifty three man roster plus the practice squad, I think that's just going to be the reality for the next little bit until they settle into a bit of a rhythm exactly.
And it goes back to something we've talked about all through off season and just getting all these coaches here, that this is a this is a teaching coaching staff, right. I mean, it's the kind of staff that that has mentorship opportunities. There's a bevy of experience and great football minds around here between you know, Jim Caldwell and Dom and Frank and Josh is a big teacher. Even though he's a little less you know, coaching experience, he has
a ton of playing experience. We talk about it a lot, but this is the kind of coaching staff to nurture a roster like this, and it's interesting to see it shake out like this, like you said, where the backups are young, because it's kind of the way the coaching staff whenever you'd think the conventional wisdom with it being put together is that this is a staff of so much knowledge to share and now they have an opportunity
to share it with these young talented people. So I think that's also maybe a part of it that I didn't even consider until we were talking about it, but it all kind of goes together with this if we were writting a novel, a big, old overarching storyline about all of this, which is you put these coaches, these types of coaches, and these experienced coaches in place, and you, you know, get them with the people who you know
are going to start. You know, some people who have a little bit of experience here, some people have more than others. And then a lot of young guys that they're attaining just to see, you know, what they can teach them and what they can make them become versus you know, I mean, just giving them an opportunity.
I think that's pretty cool.
Yeah, it is interesting, and what that means is there's going to be a lot of getting to know you for the next little bit.
So this is kind of your department.
So tell us everything you know about Emir Smith Marsette, the new wide receiver who arrived late Monday night in a trade with the Chiefs.
Absolutely got to talk with him yesterday in the locker room. I will say he was He's one of those people when you talk to him for the first time. I use a transcription service and you look and usually the first couple times you interview a guy, especially one on one, they give shorter answers, you know, because they're still warming up to you. Maybe toward the end you'll get more.
His answers were already big chunks paragraphs. He liked to answer my questions or at least talk, and for someone who had been here less than forty eight hours, he seemed already fairly comfortable. I think that's helped by the fact that he knows Adam Thalin and they seem to have like a pretty good relationship back whenever he was a rookie I think it was twenty twenty one in Minnesota, talking about each other. I talked with Faling about him too.
But that was something that Frank Craich alluded to when Amir got here, was, oh, yeah, we got this big vote of confidence from Adam Thalen, who knew him when when AMR was a rookie and they were both receivers together. And I think feeling alluded to him having a big personality, and it's true, he's an interesting guy. He has a lot of confidence in himself. He looked me in the eye and said he had that dog in him. So I know, we talk about that a lot in the podcast.
But that's a quote you can be looking forward to in an article about him, because he did tell me that.
But nah, I.
Think he's a good you know, if anything, he's a really good fit for the wide receiver room of a bunch of personalities between Chark and Feeling and Laviska and now you have Emir coming in. And I also asked him, wanted to include this on the podcast. He does have a longer name, and I told him this. I said, you know, your name is Mere Smith Marsett. I seen you know, could you abbreviate it? What would you prefer people to call you? And he told me that his
official nickname. If if anyone wants to pick it up, he said, you can call him mir m I double r M I R R And that's his preferred nickname. So I did ask him that. But no, he's an interesting guy. He offers a lot on the field too. I mean, he had that really good preseason with the Chiefs. I think he caught nine of his ten targets and second most receiving yards in the league in the preseason. He was a good punt returner in college with Iowa won the Big Tens return Man Award. He has a
lot of things going for him. He's a former swimmer from high school, and I don't know, I think he's an interesting fellow.
We'll see what he can actually do here.
But talking to him, I mean I talked to him for five minutes and it was a very full five minutes where I felt like, Okay, you know, I kind of get your vibe. I get your vibe and excited to see, you know, what he's able to do and maybe talk to him again.
He's obviously a big astronomy buff because if you're calling yourself Meir, obviously that's a reference to the old Russian space station.
Right, sure, sure, yes, yes, yes.
You don't want me making astronomy jokes the rest of this podcast that could only go to a dark place.
But yeah, there is a lot of new and after they set that first fifty three, after you know, Mer rolls in the door, you know, all of a sudden you get three new guys come in and throck Morton and Claudon Cheerless, whose name I'm still getting to know well and being able to say correctly, And then to Seawan Jamison, a little cornerback who's in camp with the forty nine ers this summer, and you know, all of
these guys bring a little something different. Again, throck Morton's basically the experience back up on that offensive line right now, barring any other moves, and there could be some other moves, but otherwise these are kind of experimental guys. I mean, Cherless is a big athletic, you know, run and hit guy who played at Alcorn State last year.
He actually wasn't in.
Wasn't in the joint practices when the Jets came down to Spartanburg, but they saw enough of him on preseason tape and you know their previous scouting reports, they felt like he was worth a shot.
And DeShawn Jamison's one that's going to be interesting.
Obviously, an extra cornerback here was something they were looking for going into final cuts, and the fact that he's got some return ability also kind of makes him an interesting prospect around here because I think that's one of those roles, whether it's Smith Marsett, whether it's Raheem Blackshear, or whether it's DeShawn Jamison, there's an opportunity for somebody to kind of carve out a niche for themselves as a return man, because I think that's an area that's
pretty unsettled going into the regular season among many.
On special teams. I've said one of the other big.
Takeaways from those cuts is Taber still got it. Chris Taber, the special teams coordinators still got a little bit of juice because he's got some of his guys they kept, Yes, they kept five tight ends on the initial fifty three, but one of them was Jio Ricchi, and I mean, you can call him a tight end, but his job is to be a core special team or a four phase guy under Tabor and g O is you know,
very good at that. When you think about those guys like him, Sam Franklin who are dedicated core special teams players, Kamu Gruge Hills another one. They've got a couple of those. But it's an area that's in a little bit of flux because there was a lot of you know, stability, I guess is a weird way to describe special teams, but those guys are kind of used to never knowing from one week to the next who's going to be available.
So they've turned over some of those guys. Some of the regulars like Sean Chandler, who was one of last year's guys, goes away, and they had a bunch of backups, you know, some of those older guys like the Eric Rows, the Deon Joneses, who weren't necessarily key contributors on special teams. So I think that they've gone out and they're looking for some guys who can be those kind of guys. So it's going to be interesting to see when they
get on the field. There's one more practice today after we finish recording this podcast, and then they'll take a long break before they come back Monday, and then it's on and as much excitement as there is about all the new I think when they roll in Monday after a weekend off, it's going to kind of hit a lot of people.
Of oh, there's a lot of new.
You know, it's good news bad news. So I think this team still got a lot of work to do. The good news is they're going up against a couple of teams in this division in Atlanta and New Orleans right out of the shoot, who are faced with a
lot of the same stuff. New Orleans got a brand new quarterback and Derek Carr I almost said, David, you know, the Falcons are putting this thing together on the fly as well, So I think it's kind of a jury of your peers for the first couple of weeks of the preseason.
But that's what makes this thing fat exactly.
And yesterday we hadn't talked about this yet, but yesterday Bryce Young spoke with the media. It was one of his most interesting press conferences with you know, this isn't this is kind of like a game and a half week. You know, they're doing some preparation, they're finishing up the roster, but it's not necessarily as locked in and serious, and so got some fun questions for him. He gave his take on sweet tea as a Californian, but he also talked about what he's gonna do for the next three days.
I asked him that, I said, you know, are you the top that meditates? How do you kind of get away for the next couple days whenever you're off for for Labor Day? And he said that his biggest thing is kind of you know, almost like stepping away from the building for him and he getting his mind right
to be locked in. But you could see how excited he was for week one, and uh, you know, in all the newness and everything we're talking about, this is going to be the first overall picks first game for real, and uh, he knows that.
So he's really excited about it.
And yesterday, honestly, like, if y'all haven't watched that press conference, I think it's worth watching because Bryce showed a lot of his personality when he first got here.
I remember you and I talking about it.
I think we talked about on the podcast a little bit too, but you know, wanting to see his personality show a little bit more. He was a little it was a little regiment to it, a little guarded when he first got here. But he's really started to, you know, look more comfortable, crack some jokes, smile and just have a good time.
And that blast press conference.
I don't know if you got to see it yet, Darren, but it was really really good and it was interesting.
And I don't disagree with his sweet tea take either. I don't know.
He said that it was a like a birthday cake. You know, it's very special, but you don't need it every day. I must agree, it's a little sweet for me.
Yeah, I liked it.
I think the idea of not wanting your highly tuned professional athletes to be pounding down a bunch of sweet tea every day, I think that's a reasonable take. But I am a big I mean, my go to when I stopped at Bojangles, including this morning, Bojangles a.
Proud partner with the Carolina Panthers, it's half and half.
I can't put that much sugar in me first thing in the morning anymore. I am an older person, and that will mess me up, so to speak. So's it's a little bit much. I'll go half and half first thing in the morning. I'll order unsweetened tea every now and then. If I need caffeine later in the day and it's one hundred degrees, I'm not gonna go full JJ Jansen and hot black coffee late in the afternoon when it's still August.
But every now and then, when you need a caffeine pop in the afternoon glass of unsweetened tea. There's nothing wrong with that.
Exactly exactly.
I mean, that's something my family's adjusted to overtimes with a lot of different things.
But I was never a sweet tea girl at all, and I grew up in Georgia.
So I feel like I am allowed to have my Southern opinion on that. But I was never crazy about sweet tea.
I was a lemonade girl.
I would I could do an Arnold Palmer because it was like a little bit sour enough, but that too sweet. Oh So yesterday I kind of kept to myself. I didn't want it because there was a lot of a lot of chatter like, oh my goodness, Bress you are because he also has that partnership with Bojangles. It's like you have to you know, sweet tea, Oh my goodness, And I was like, I think he gave a very diplomatic answer on that because I would have stood up there and been like, you know what, I like sweet
tea and very minimal doses. So I want it to almost like help him out there and be like Bryce, you know you're you're not alone in that. And plus he's he's been in the South longer than when he's been here. He went to Alabama. I think that's something that we've seen a lot of, like, oh man, California, Dude's like he's been in the South for like three or four years.
No, he's knows, he knows what's up? He knows what's up.
Oh man, it's a different world.
But no, he also made a very good point, and this is one thing I want to touch on as we get out of here.
Uh for the weekend.
I mean, he did say, you know, he needs to kind of recharge, he needs to hit reset a little bit. So going into the Long Weekend podcast, Matt, what do you got cooking Labor Day weekend?
Uh?
I think I work a soccer game.
So oh no, So I am in that point where the two seasons are overlapping.
So yeah, I think you guys have the weekend off. You're the hardest working man in the building. Is that is such a lie?
It? Yeah, it's that time of year, I know, and I mean Augusta, you and I have talked about it.
We've each got plans this weekend. Football. You know, I sound like Danny Rojas here. Football is life.
Football becomes your life during the regular season.
So this is like that last chance we've got.
And I'm kind of I've been sort of covetous of this weekend. It's like the wife and I are going off, We're heading out of town for a quick for a quick trip. I know, you're going out of town. You've just got to reset every now in, don't you.
Absolutely?
And it's funny that you say that, because I know football will be consuming our lives. But I actually am just chasing down a different kind of football this weekend.
I am very excited. I think it's going to be awesome.
The Battle of the Carolina is here at Bank of America Stadium for the Duke's Mayo Classic between South Carolina North Carolina. I will not be in Charlotte. I'm going to see my alma mater play. So I am going to Athens because looking at the Panthers schedule, looking at the Georgia schedule, there is absolutely no opportunity to go to Athens given our week is when I think they're at Vanderbilt, So that's not gonna work.
What high school are you guys playing this weekend?
Oh?
We are playing UT Martins right on, gotcha? But no, I'm super excited.
I haven't been back actually to a Georgia game in person since the two national championships subtleflex, so we'll see three peat time.
What is a UT Martin anyway?
A Skyhawk?
Duh?
Of course everybody knows that.
That's where I'll be. But yeah, if you need me, I'm actually I'm using my one last football this weekend to just find more football.
So I'm a little ate up with it. I fear.
That's uh, you know, that is one way to do it.
I will look forward to next week's full scouting report on the UT Martin Skyhawks or whatever they are allegedly. We'll find out all about that. We'll find out all about a regular season, and when we talk to you guys again, it'll be September and it'll be a week one of the regular season, and it'll be on.
And we will remain the happy half hour
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